SOY seeks to be force for good in Bay County

SOY, or Save Our Youth, is a movement borne out of the recent violence in the Glenwood community, first with the slaying of Alton Mills in December, and Owen Frazier less than two weeks later.

ERYN DION News Herald Reporter @PCNHErynDion

PANAMA CITY — Despite the late hour and time of the year, the rhythmic pounding of basketballs against hardwood and stuttering screech of sneakers on a gym floor echoed out the open door of the Rosenwald High School gymnasium.

Inside, about a dozen boys in mismatched school shirts ran drills. They came from all corners of the county and beyond — students from Jinks, Everitt, Merritt Brown, Bay Haven, Surfside and even Chipley middle schools — but laughed, joked and played together like childhood friends. Their coach, Timothy “Scooter” Brown, watched from the bleachers.

“This is what SOY is really about right here,” he said, gesturing to the team. “Just getting different kids from a bunch of different sides of town to understand that you don’t got to hate a person.”

SOY, or Save Our Youth, is a movement borne out of the recent violence in the Glenwood community, starting with the slaying of Alton Mills in December and Owen Frazier less than two weeks later. It started as a group of six or seven men getting together to hold signs on the side of the road urging a stop to the violence. Soon, those same guys were holding informal football and basketball practices in a field in their neighborhood every evening, giving the youth something to do that wasn’t hanging around the streets and getting in trouble.

“We started from something real small,” said David Jones, president of Save Our Youth of Bay County Inc., now a nonprofit with 501(c)(3) status. “But when we did our first fun day in Foxwood (Apartments), it was huge. People started seeing it and they were like, ‘Hey, I want to join.’ ”

“I was like, join?” Jones recalled, laughing. “That was new to me.”

What makes SOY different, Jones said, is that its leaders have all been where these kids are now, and they’re able to reach the youth on that level. Jones has been to prison three times and understands what many of the area's young men are going through, why they’re out in the streets trying to make money.

“I’ve been out there in the streets,” Jones said. “There’s not too many crimes I haven’t committed, and it’s not worth it at the end. At the end you’re either dead or in prison.”

Forming the force

After a month or two of informal gatherings, Jones knew they needed to get SOY off the ground and make it official. He’d been listening in at meetings around town, like Voices Against Violence held by the LEAD Coalition, and learned a thing or two about organizing. They needed to form a board, he told the group, with officers and a president. They brought in Secretary Shamika Arnold, Treasurer Alesia Rhodes and member Detria Gainer to help with paperwork, and Save Our Youth of Bay County Inc. was officially born, with Jones as its president.

“You don’t want to get a big head,” Jones said. “You just continue to be consistent. It’s something you just have to do, especially with the responsibility of being president, because everything falls back on you.”

If Jones is the head of SOY, then Brown, tall and sage-like, with long twisting deadlocks hanging just below his shoulders, is the man of action, the unwavering drive to keep the kids on his basketball team — and all the kids in SOY — from slipping down the wrong path. For him, that means basketball practice every night in the Rosenwald gym, where he’s more than just a coach, but a mentor.

“At the end of every practice, we sit down and I talk to them about life and what goes on around the world,” said Brown, the organization’s vice president. “We do it every day so they understand. They feel the change in their own life.

“That’s what SOY is really about,” he continued. “We’re not trying to get no money. We couldn’t care less about money. It’s all about what can you do to impact a child’s life. This is my part of it. I impact these kids on an everyday basis.”

Part of that dedication is borne out of the memory of Alton Mills, who Brown coached on a basketball team very similar to the one practicing Wednesday at Rosenwald. He was 9, Brown remembered, and already talented. But mentally, Brown wasn’t in the same space he is now, and when Mills started slipping away, instead of holding on tighter, he let him go.

“If I had this mentality then, I would have never let those kids slide away,” he said.

When asked if his work with SOY was a way to give back after what happened with Mills, to maybe stop another neighborhood boy from following that path, the normally laid back Brown grew serious.

“I’d give my life for them before I just let them go astray like that,” he said. “I’d give my life for them because I know they’re good kids. They just need that guidance — that one person that will listen to them.”

Earning trust

From day one, SOY’s mantra has been consistency, often a problem when other groups or organizations try to get into higher crime places like Foxwood or Macedonia Garden Apartments. If it’s not consistent, Brown said, it’s not worth doing, so every night they showed up. They went in to Foxwood four or five nights a week with a ball, walking around and talking to kids, making sure they were safe. They’d go in at night, when other groups can’t, Brown said, because that’s when the kids needed them the most.

“There’s nothing happening there that can scare me,” Brown said. “If you’re afraid of these kids’ lives, how can you help them?”

And that consistency has earned the trust of a notoriously hard to reach group — children growing up in and around violence, who are taught not to talk about the things they see and not to trust strangers.

“There’s a lot of kids, and all their life, the only thing they see is people coming in and out,” Brown said. “If you go to a kid, you can tell them all the nice things they want to hear, but if you leave, you’re just like the last person that came and left.”

Sure, Brown, Jones and the rest of SOY can talk to these kids now, but most importantly, Brown said, they can listen — listen to what they like, who they are and who they want to be.

“If you don’t ask a kid what they like, you can’t help them,” Brown said. “You can’t help a kid fulfill their dream if you don’t know what their dreams are.”

With nonprofit status, an office and a sprawling web of contacts and partnerships, SOY is very carefully growing its vision. Brown said it’s important for everyone in the organization to be on the same page and moving toward the same goal.

Jones wants to start looking for ways to get some of the neighborhood kids out of their apartment complexes for activities; SOY already has held a Daddy-Daughter Dance for Father’s Day and an Easter Egg hunt at Foxwood. They’re planning a free Glow Party Skate Night in July, a back-to-school drive, and will be holding a free summer camp from July 3 to Aug. 11 for children ages 4 to 14 at Joe Moody Harris Park. The goal, Jones said, is to hold a free family activity at least once a month.

“We’ve got people in different places, but they’re all a part of SOY,” Jones said. “It’s all about reaching out to these kids and showing them they can have a better future and make communities safer.”